Hometown Reverie

Daddy says the hills turned gold in October

Mama smiles like she can still see the road

I sat on the floor by my father's chair

While mama traced a river in the air

They named every porch and pasture gate Like I should know

them by heart

But I was born with a different sky

And a map made out of their missing parts

They laughed about the corner store

Then went quiet at the rain

I heard a whole life in the pause

Between a smile and pain

Take me back to a home I never knew

To the gravel road that carried you

I can see it when you close your eyes A kitchen light,

a summer moon If memory is a borrowed view Let me stand

there beside you

Mama kept a tin of yellowed names

Cousins I had never met

She said the church bell shook the windows

When the whole town sang again

My father's hands went still and small

Holding years he couldn't mend

Take me back to a home I never knew

To the gravel road that carried you

I can see it when you close your eyes A kitchen light,

a summer moon If memory is a borrowed view Let me stand

there beside you

(oh,

beside you) I never walked that creek bed dry Never carved my

name in that old pine

Still I carry what

they had to leave

Like roots beneath a borrowed tree

Take me back to a home I never knew

I can see it in the way they do

Not behind us, not gone for good

It's in the stories that got us through

Let me stand there beside you (oh,

beside you) Their old road runs through me now